Though I'm not a programmer, from what I gather it doesn't really matter which distro you choose .. they all have the same languages/IDE's/etc. .. though there may be differences in the "version" of packages available through the package manager.

So if it's going to come down to the best "desktop" distro .. that's very subjective, and you'll get lots of different opinions

Are you new to Linux ?

What hardware are you planning on running Linux on ? .. is the hardware old and limited ?

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Well that's going to happily run any distro you want .. as you're new to Linux, I'd suggest Ubuntu 12.04, or Linux Mint 13, for no other reason than you'll find more tutorials, help, online resources available for Ubuntu based distros.(or Peppermint 3 if you want speed at the *slight* expense of ease of setup .. Peppermint is *my* current favorite)

All of those are based on Ubuntu .. kinda obvious in the case of Ubuntu itself .. so all have access to all the software in the Ubuntu software repositories

But you can test drive Linux before installing, by creating a LiveCD or LiveUSB (stick) .. these will give you a working desktop without making changes to your hard drive until you're ready to install. That way you can test drive a few distros and find the one that suits you best.

If you need further info about LiveCD/LiveUSB's or anything else .. just ask

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GEARHEAD_TI

As a software developer I prefer to use Peppermint 3, it has useful tools such as software manager that contain specialised software for developers which work out the box. I would personally stay away from linux distributions such as Mandriva and anything to do with RedHat.

I would personally stay away from linux distributions such as Mandriva and anything to do with RedHat.

Strange, I have used Mandriva for quite a while for development. Most of the development tool-sets I needed were pre installed. On the other hand in all the distros I used since, the tools were just a few clicks in the package manager (apt-get install, or rpm -i, or pacman -S) anyway.